The four incumbents, who represent the Schuylkill County voters in the state Senate and House of Representative, rode on the wave of a high voter turnout to win re-election in Tuesday's general election.

A total of 67.75 percent of the registered voters cast their ballot. A total of 58,481 out of 86,317 registered voters went to the polls. The Republican Party posted 53.70 percent and the Democratic Party, 40.85 percent.David G. Argall won re-election to the state senate in the 29th senatorial District, defeating Tim Seip, Democrat, a former state legislator. Unofficial returns gave Argall 30,489 votes in Schuylkill County and Seip 26,402 votes.Jerry Knowles, Republican, won re-election as representative to the 124th State Legislature District, defeating Dante Picciano, an Independent. Unofficial returns gave Knowles 11,087 votes in Schuylkill County and Picciano 3,684 votes.Mike G. Tobash, Republican, won re-election as representative to the 125th State Legislative District defeating Vicki Harman, Democrat. Tobash unofficially received 15,326 votes in Schuylkill County and Harman 5,949.Neal P. Goodman, Democrat, was unopposed in his bid for re-election as representative to the 123rd Legislative District unofficially receiving 16,734 votes in Schuylkill County.There were 261 write-in votes which will be counted by the computing board beginning Friday.Congressional raceAlthough he did not win in Schuylkill County, Matthew Cartwright, Democrat, won the election to become the new Congressman representing the 17th Congressional District, which includes all of Schuylkill County.Cartwright's unofficial total was 140,634 to 86,252 for Cummings, a 2-to-1 margin.In the unofficial returns from Schuylkill County, Cartwright received 26,402 votes and Laureen A. Cummings, Republican, 29,118 votes. There were 430 write-in votes with most of them believed to be for former Congressman Tim Holden, who lost to Cartwright in the primary election.Cartwright didn't need Schuylkill as he won every other county in the district.His biggest margin was in his home county, and that of Cummings, Lackawanna. Cartwright won there by a whopping 48,500 to 15,944 for the Republican.The other votes by county were: Luzerne, Cartwright 26,352 to 10,594; Carbon, Cartwright 8,498 to 7,844; Monroe, Cartwright 19,891 to 15,043; and Northampton, Cartwright 27,901 to 24,137.In the contest for President, the Romney/Ryan Republican team unofficially received 32,082 votes in Schuylkill County and Obama/Biden, Democrats, the incumbent president and vice president, received 24,364 votes.The contest for U.S. Senator, Tom Smith, Republican, unofficially received 31,463 votes in Schuylkill County and Incumbent Sen. Bob Casey Jr., 24,453 votes.State racesIn the contest for State Attorney General, David J. Freed, Republican, unofficially received 26,012 votes in Schuylkill County and Kathleen G. Kane, Democrat, 29,084.In the race for State Auditor General, John Maher, Republican, received unofficially 29,364 votes in Schuylkill County and Eugene A. Depasquale, Democrat, 22,478 votes.In the contest for State Treasurer, Diane Irey Vaughan, Republican, received unofficially 26,195 votes in Schuylkill County, and Robert M. McCord, Democrat, 26,560 votes.All the Democratic candidates won statewide and were elected."It was a great election," Commissioner George Halcovage commented after the vote count was completed around 10:30 p.m. Tuesday night at the election center, which is located in the warehouse of the STS building in the Saint Clair Industrial Park.He also reported he didn't hear of any disturbances at the polling places and there were no campaigning for candidates at the polls. A number of precinct workers returning the results from their polling places commented about the big turnout of voters.One worker said they were so busy they couldn't leave their post to go to the rest room. In a number of precincts which have a large registration for the first time in years, there were lines of voters waiting outside the polling places.Commissioner Frank Staudenmeier commented it would be nice to have such a large turnout come out during the municipal elections when local candidates run. In the past the voter percentage for local elections was in the 30 percent turnout.Election director Frannie Brennan said a few voters were turned away because their registrations had expired. They hadn't voted in years and thought their registration was still valid. The election bureau issues a letter of warning to voters who have missed voting for a couple of years to remind them they must reregister.